A post on GamesIndustry.biz (registration required) follows up on reports of development woes as well as worker complaints at Team Bondi, developers of well-received detective game L.A. Noire. This new story, by author of the original whistle blowing article, reproduces a number of emails showing an ever-deteriorating relationship between Team Bondi and publisher Rockstar Games, and includes indications that Rockstar will not be publishing Team Bondi's next game, and the Aussie developer will not be crating the next L.A. Noire game. Here's the overview:

It's pretty well reported now that the working conditions were bad. What hasn't been discussed yet (from what I've seen) is the relationship between Team Bondi and Rockstar. I've heard a lot about Rockstar's disdain for Team Bondi, and it has been made quite clear that they will not publish Team Bondi's next game. Team Bondi are trying to find another publisher for their next title, but the relationship with Rockstar has been badly damaged - Brendan treats L.A. Noire like a success due to his vision but I think Rockstar are the ones who saved the project. They continued to sink money into LA Noire, and their marketing was fantastic. Without their continued support, Team Bondi would have gone under several years ago.

Rockstar also made a huge contribution to the development; their producers were increasingly influential over the last two years of the game's development, and overruled many of the insane decisions made by Team Bondi management. At a lower level, Rockstar also pitched in with programmers, animators, artists, QA, etc. Part of the conflict between Team Bondi and Rockstar was due to Rockstar's frustration with Team Bondi's direction, and eventually Team Bondi's management in turn resented Rockstar for taking lots of creative control. It's also worth pointing out that Rockstar used to be very keen on making Team Bondi something like 'Rockstar Sydney' - the more they worked with Team Bondi management, the more they came to understand that this was a terrible idea. I have a few logs that show the relationship souring – see below.

Honestly, the story of Niko Bellec and the entirety of Liberty City was a pure work of art.

I think we're in the minority, but I consider GTA 4 the best of the bunch. It's characters, city design, people on the street, radio stations (commercials, DJs)...it really felt like this living city to me.

There's not many games I play through 3 times, but I think GTA 4 is going to be one of them.

my guess would be either Rockstar or T2. Neither of them would have sunk money into LA Noire and then let Bondi own the property.

I'm hoping it's R*. And yeah, that was my thought also - nothings free, and R* put in both manpower and advertising (making sure to mention it was a R* game).